Gerard Depardieu’s Comic Russian Adventure

Jan. 8 (Bloomberg) -- As they embraced, they looked just
like Obelix and Asterix, the two comic-book Gallic warriors: the
bear-like French movie star Gerard Depardieu and the short and
energetic Russian President Vladimir Putin. And indeed, the
occasion for their photo opportunity -- the granting of Russian
citizenship to Depardieu -- was a comic plot come true.

Depardieu, who has actually played the role of Obelix in
French movies, didn’t initially set his sights on Russia. He was
reported to be moving to a Belgian village just across the
border from France, a location that would allow him to avoid
France’s new 75 percent income-tax rate for people making more
than 1 million euros a year. Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault
publicly called the expatriation “minable,” meaning “shabby” or
“pitiful,” prompting an irate Depardieu to say he would
relinquish his French passport.

The film star took things a step further during a farewell
party in Paris. At the event, according to a Dec. 18 report in
Le Monde, the actor said, facetiously, that “Putin has already
sent me a passport.”

The very next day, though, Putin responded with utter
seriousness: “If Gerard really wants a Russian residence permit
or passport, consider that done.”

Russian legislation does not allow anyone to gain
citizenship in less than three months. To be eligible for the
fast track, one has to be a national of a former Soviet republic
and already holding a Russian residence permit. In the standard
scenario, an applicant must first spend five years in Russia,
never leaving for more than 90 days.

Putin is unhappy with the citizenship procedure. On Dec.
12, just as Depardieu’s row with the French government was
unfolding, Putin said that Russia needed to cut red tape so it
could attract people “spiritually and culturally close to it.”

Depardieu has done his best to prove that Putin’s
definition of a desirable new citizen applies to him. “I adore
your country, Russia, your people, your history, your writers,”
he wrote in a letter to Russian journalists, explaining his
application for a Russian passport. “I adore your culture and
your way of thinking. My father was a Communist in his time and
he listened to Radio Moscow! That, too, is part of my culture.”

The official explanation for the gift of Russian
citizenship to Depardieu was that he had rendered outstanding
services to cinematography. Putin specifically praised
Depardieu’s role as the mystic Rasputin in a Russian movie that
has yet to reach cinemas. Riding the wave of public interest,
the television channel NTV aired another Russian movie featuring
Depardieu -- “Nothing Is Impossible for Kings,” a melodrama
about a French princess visiting her grandmother’s native
Russia.

The way Putin bypassed the official citizenship procedure
made some commentators wonder whether he was underselling his
country. “I think when a person receives a passport, he must get
more pleasure out of it than those who are issuing it,”
journalist Leonid Mlechin told Echo Moskvy radio. “Otherwise one
gets the feeling that the passport is not worth much.” Mlechin
cited the example of Arnold Schwarzenegger, who he said had to
wait 15 years for U.S. citizenship.

Depardieu, for his part, seemed to enjoy his Russian
adventure, mugging happily for the cameras with his newly issued
passport. After meeting Putin in the Black Sea resort town of
Sochi, he visited Saransk, the backwater capital of Mordovia, a
tiny region in Central Russia about 400 miles east of Moscow.
When the local governor offered him the post of regional
minister for culture, Depardieu declined, saying, “I am the
world’s minister for culture,” according to the television
station NTV.

If the actor establishes tax residency in Russia, which
means living in the country for more than half of each year, he
will be eligible for sharply lower taxes than in France. Russia
has a flat 13 percent personal income tax rate, two percentage
points lower than Hong Kong -- an advantage some Russian
officials see as a powerful enticement for future high-profile
immigrants.

“Few people in the West are aware of the Russian tax
system,” Deputy Prime Minister Dmitri Rogozin wrote on Twitter.
“When they find out, we should expect mass migration of wealthy
Europeans to Russia.”

So far, no billionaires have followed the impulsive movie
actor’s lead. Perhaps they’re aware of the other side of
Russia’s favorable personal tax regime: No one’s property or
business is safe from an all-seeing, interfering state. It may
just be that Russia’s tax climate is ideal only for someone like
Depardieu, who does not own factories or run a large-scale
business operation in Russia, and who is famous enough to be
treated as a demigod by everyone including corrupt police.

Russian citizenship entails at least one other
inconvenience: Visas are required to travel to most countries,
including EU members. Depardieu’s passport is an “internal”
version, which serves as Russia’s ID card domestically but
cannot be used for foreign travel. Apparently, the movie star
retained a European travel document, because on Jan. 8 Depardieu
was already in Zurich, attending world soccer’s Golden Ball
award ceremony.

“I have a Russian passport but I remain French, and of
course I will keep dual Belgian nationality,” Depardieu told
L’Equipe 21 television.

After playing his part in Putin’s promotion campaign for
Russian citizenship, Depardieu is back on the European star
circuit. Putin, meanwhile, is back to the business of convincing
his people that they live in a great country that famous French
actors would be happy to call home.

In an interview with Echo Moskvy radio, political analyst
Stanislav Belkovsky called the Depardieu case a reflection of
Putin’s “provincial complex.”

“Giving Russian citizenship to an old drunk fleeing taxes
in his country is an incredibly wise and effective move,”
Belkovsky said with biting sarcasm.

(Leonid Bershidsky, an editor and novelist, is Moscow and Kiev
correspondent for World View. Opinions expressed are his own.)